Kovack Advisors Inc. Takes Position in Crown Castle Inc. $CCI

Kovack Advisors Inc. acquired a new stake in Crown Castle Inc. (NYSE:CCI) during the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor acquired 38,573 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock, valued at approximately $3,428,000.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its stake in shares of Crown Castle by 0.6% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 69,769,393 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $6,200,406,000 after buying an additional 386,733 shares in the last quarter. State Street Corp grew its stake in shares of Crown Castle by 1.2% in the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 21,728,541 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $2,096,587,000 after buying an additional 266,963 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC grew its stake in shares of Crown Castle by 1.4% in the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 13,027,749 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $1,156,972,000 after buying an additional 184,533 shares in the last quarter. Deutsche Bank AG grew its stake in shares of Crown Castle by 40.5% in the fourth quarter. Deutsche Bank AG now owns 7,159,803 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $636,292,000 after buying an additional 2,065,247 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Norges Bank bought a new position in shares of Crown Castle in the fourth quarter valued at $594,670,000. 90.77% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several research firms recently weighed in on CCI. Truist Financial began coverage on shares of Crown Castle in a research note on Tuesday, March 31st. They issued a “hold” rating and a $90.00 target price for the company. Weiss Ratings reissued a “hold (c-)” rating on shares of Crown Castle in a research note on Friday, May 22nd. KeyCorp raised their target price on shares of Crown Castle from $98.00 to $105.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 23rd. BMO Capital Markets raised their target price on shares of Crown Castle from $91.00 to $100.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, April 17th. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group raised their target price on shares of Crown Castle from $84.00 to $89.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a research note on Tuesday, April 14th. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, six have given a Buy rating and twelve have issued a Hold rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $98.52.

Crown Castle Price Performance

CCI stock opened at $92.13 on Friday. The company has a fifty day moving average price of $88.80 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $87.69. Crown Castle Inc. has a one year low of $75.96 and a one year high of $115.76. The stock has a market cap of $40.21 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 38.07, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.47 and a beta of 0.93.

Crown Castle (NYSE:CCI) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, April 22nd. The real estate investment trust reported $1.02 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.47 by $0.55. Crown Castle had a net margin of 25.13% and a negative return on equity of 64.64%. The firm had revenue of $1.01 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $995.42 million. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $1.10 earnings per share. The company’s revenue for the quarter was down 4.9% compared to the same quarter last year. Crown Castle has set its FY 2026 guidance at 4.380-4.490 EPS. Research analysts anticipate that Crown Castle Inc. will post 4.22 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Crown Castle Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, June 30th. Shareholders of record on Monday, June 15th will be given a dividend of $1.0625 per share. This represents a $4.25 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 4.6%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, June 15th. Crown Castle’s payout ratio is 175.62%.

About Crown Castle

Crown Castle is a U.S.-focused communications infrastructure company organized as a real estate investment trust (REIT) that owns, operates and leases shared wireless infrastructure. Its primary business consists of providing tower-based site leases, small cell networks and fiber solutions that support mobile voice and data transmission for wireless carriers, cable companies and other enterprise customers. The company’s assets are positioned to enable network coverage and capacity, including the densification projects associated with 4G LTE and 5G deployments.

Its product and service offerings include ground-based tower sites that host multiple wireless operators, distributed small cell nodes and associated fiber backhaul used to connect sites into carrier networks, and site development and maintenance services.